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Following up on a mystery

Earlier this year, I shared an interesting approach one company – Mosaic – used to get some attention to their product. The Great Yield Mystery was a series of podcasts where the story of poor-yield event for a Minnesota farmer unfolded.

The Great Yield Mystery podcast, created by Mosaic, has a little fun with what can impact soybean yields. You can check out all the episodes from the Website if you want a chance to win a prize, and get insight on soybean yields.

The podcast has wrapped up and the deadline is approaching to solve the mystery and have a chance for you to win a prize. If you haven’t been listening to the podcast all along (harvest did end early, which may have limited your in-cab podcast listening) you can catch up at the Great Yield Mystery website to listen to all 10 episodes.

The podcast does go through a lot of questions the fictional farmer investigated to get to the bottom of the problem. The story being that Gerald Fitzgerald saw a soybean yield slump following a previous year where he had seen a record corn yield in the same field (“the highest they can remember in the county”).

The podcast creators used the story approach to explore a number of potential issues the farmer faced that may have hit that soybean yield including questions like:

* Did they calibrate their new planter correctly?

* Did they select the right seed for their needs?

* Was planting done on the best day?

* Should they have applied fungicide?

* Did they use the right fertilizer?

I’ll be honest, chances are that since this is sponsored by Mosaic there are a few of those questions above that are traditional mystery red herrings designed to throw you off. But if you like solving a good mystery there could be a Yeti Cooler in it for you. You can check out all 10 episodes to work through the mystery either by subscribing on iTunes, or use this handy link that includes access to all the recordings.

As I noted when I wrote about this earlier this year, I found it an interesting way to get potential customers engaged in a conversation that goes beyond simple brand recognition. Companies are using a variety of tools to reach out to potential customers these days as you’re increasingly busy. If someone engages in something like this podcast and spends time listening to the episodes it boosts engagement with the company and its products.

So if you’ve got time and you want to enter for the chance at a Yeti Tundra 125 Cooler, you have until Dec. 24 to enter. Check out the podcast and learn more at the website. You solve the mystery by visting the cropnutrition.com Facebook page.

Leave a comment below if you have thoughts on this approach to connecting with farmers.